Pelvis

Abstract

It is estimated that approximately 2,000 new cases of bone sarcomas and 5,700 cases of soft tissue sarcomas are diagnosed annually in the United States. Approximately 5-10% of these tumors primarily involve the pelvis. Major advances in our understanding of sarcoma biology have led to advances in chemotherapy and surgical techniques that offer the patients with nonmetastatic disease the potential for longterm disease-free survival and cure rates exceeding 50%. This is especially true for the two most common bone sarcomas, osteosarcoma and Ewing's sarcoma. In addition, advances in preoperative imaging studies have allowed surgeons to define the anatomic extent of disease more accurately, and thereby plan surgical procedures with curative intent more precisely. However, these rates of cure for malignant tumors involving the pelvis are often lower than those involving the extremities. This may be due to the complexity of the anatomy of the pelvis making resection with wide margins very difficult. © 2010 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.